Case C‑322/15

Google Ireland Limited

and

Google Italy Srl

v

Autorità per le Garanzie nelle Comunicazioni

(Request for a preliminary ruling

from the Tribunale amministrativo regionale per il Lazio)

‛Reference for a preliminary ruling — Article 53(2) and Article 94 of the Rules of Procedure of the Court of Justice — Lack of sufficient information concerning the factual and legal context of the dispute in the main proceedings and the reasons justifying the need for a reply to the question referred — Manifest inadmissibility’

Summary — Order of the Court (Fourth Chamber), 8 September 2016

Questions referred for a preliminary ruling — Admissibility — Need to provide the Court with sufficient information on the factual and legislative context — Scope — Application not providing sufficient detail on the factual and legal context — Impossibility for the Court to provide a useful answer to the referring court — Manifest inadmissibility

(Art. 267 TFEU; Rules of Procedure of the Court of Justice, Arts 53(2) and 94)

A request for a preliminary ruling is manifestly inadmissible if it is limited to stating that a decision of a national communications safeguards authority was adopted following legislative amendments for the purposes of extending to advertising concessionaires which negotiate advertising space on the internet and to companies having their headquarters abroad the obligation to disclose economic system information, but that neither the scope, the content nor the detailed rules on the obligation which had its scope extended, are explained in that request.

It is essential that the request for a preliminary ruling should indicate the tenor of the national provisions applicable in the case in the main proceedings and, where appropriate, the relevant national case-law, in order to allow those referred to in Article 23 of the Statute of the Court of Justice and the Court itself to assess whether that obligation is compliant with EU law, having regard in particular to its nature, content and scope.

Where, in a case, the subject matter of which relates to a possible restriction of a fundamental freedom, the referring court has not put the Court in a position to be able to assess the existence and extent of such a restriction and, if appropriate, to examine its justification, including, in particular, the examination of the proportionality of that restriction, the Court is not in a position to provide a useful answer to the referring court. In particular, while it is true that the protection of competition and pluralism constitute compelling reasons of general interest capable of justifying restrictions of the freedom to provide services, only a sufficiently detailed description of how that objective is pursued by that decision would allow the Court to determine whether and to what extent it is suitable and necessary for the purpose of attaining the public-interest objective pursued.

(See paras 25-32, operative part)